(Photo Courtesy of Disney)Any time a popular work of art is poised to be remade or adapted in some capacity, its legions of fans cannot help but to lose their minds. Hell hath no fury like a fan of a book or movie who has just found out another artist wants to deviate from the source material. Reverence to original material is never a guarantee of quality, nor is a complete departure always a bad sign. That said, there is always a reluctance to take a radically different approach to tried-and-true material.
Of course, somebody forgot to tell that to Julie Taymor, or if they did, she just does not give a... well, that word.
For those unfamiliar, Julie Taymor is a Tony-winning theater and film director who is solely responsible for most of the plays and movies that make loyalists to favorite works of fiction lose sleep at night. Particularly fond of inexplicably dropping motorcycles and Russell Brand into the works of William Shakespeare, Taymor's modus operandi is to take subjects near and dear to people and filter them through her unique vision, a vision that is terrifying, hilarious and quite frankly and most of all baffling.
When this approach works, oh boy does it work. Taymor's Broadway re-imagining of "The Lion King" is one of the most successful plays of all time, grossing more than $1 billion with no signs of slowing down. Yes, billion. With a "B."
On the other hand, monumental disasters like "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark" can happen. "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark" ended up becoming the biggest financial failure in Broadway history and featured some highly questionable costumes and songs written by Bono and The Edge of U2, artists whose work is arguably so dreadful that people forced Apple to let them delete their most recent album that they received for free.
Taymor has not made a film since 2010's gleefully silly adaptation of "The Tempest," which was interesting but failed to capture audiences in the same way her Beatles musical "Across the Universe" did a few years prior. For the most part, there has been radio silence from her over the last few years.
Surely she is in the position to do, or not do, whatever she wants. Again, "The Lion King" made more than $1 billion. If Taymor wants to stick to her guns and make more awesome Shakespeare plays, cool. But why not swing for the fences again and potentially cheese off millions of people in the most gloriously nutty way possible?
There are so many possibilities! For example, nobody has made a live-action film based on the Pokémon universe, wherein you become an adult at 10 and the entire economy is centered around animal abuse. It is a vibrant, endlessly creative series that continues to be adored by just about everyone under the age of 35.
Can you imagine what Julie Taymor could do with it? She would probably make all the gym leaders luchadores! Charizard would become a hot pink cybernetic dragon that lactates cotton candy. Alan Cumming could play Pikachu!
If that does not tickle her fancy, she could consider adapting a visionary novel that has already been depicted on stage and screen. How about George Orwell's "Animal Farm?"
All the animals can be played by men in neon colored rubber suits. The setting could be changed to a modern-day industrial farm where the animals have no room to move around. They can all have iPhones for some reason. One of the pigs can have a mild addiction to the game "Angry Birds." Do you see how easy this would be?
The list of properties Julie Taymor could absolutely crush is endless. A musical version of "Deliverance." A live-action "Shrek" movie that is actually a musical based around Alanis Morissette's "Jagged Little Pill." A re-imagining of "Pocahontas" where everyone is blue and lives on a distant... oh wait, that exists already. Never mind.
You may reach the reporter at zheltzel@asu.edu or follow him on Twitter @zachheltzel
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